London Klezmer group for Shir Madness

February 29, 2012 by  
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The London Klezmer Quartet will appear at Jewish music festival Shir Madness in Sydney next month as part of an Australian tour.

 

The London Klezmer Quartet

Highy-acclaimed as being amongst Europe’s finest klezmer talent,  the Quartet will present a heady mix of traditional and original melodies. On their first Australian tour and they will have audiences dancing in the aisles on a 20-date schedule performing in Sydney, Melbourne, Bendigo, Newcastle, Central Coast, Wollongong and the National Folk Festival in Canberra. “A stylish debut from four highly accomplished and in-demand musicians creating moments of genuine storm’”. (Folk Roots magazine)

Amy Ray of the Indigo Girls says, “The London Klezmer Quartet brims with musicality and elicits every emotion possible in my soul… I want to laugh, I want to cry, but most importantly I want to dance!”

The band’s traditional and self-penned melodies will take audiences on a Jewish Odyssey from Eastern Europe to Australia via the Balkans, Turkey, the US and London. The band’s traditional sound evokes a fervour and joy reminiscent of the Jewish minstrels who kept people dancing, crying and laughing in the ‘shtetls’ of eastern Europe for hundreds of years, where they were the essential ingredient at every wedding celebration.

The LKQ are innovators and emerging leaders in the international klezmer scene and will appear on stages as diverse as the Famous Spiegeltent in Melbourne and the Sydney Jewish Museum. The enthusiastic response to the band’s Australian tour from a wide spectrum of venues reflects the huge appeal of this celebratory and soulful music.  The band will also give workshops at universities and schools and teach the dance steps that go with the melodies at community halls around the country.  Much in demand also as educators Ilana’s definitive guide to playing Klezmer commissioned by Oxford University press is “the best exposition I’ve come across of Eastern European-style Jewish fiddle playing…Highly recommended.” (Folk Roots Magazine).

The band is “fabulous, professional and a joy to watch and listen to” (UK Jewish Music Institute), and their music is “exquisite” (radio Sefarad).  Their debut album has won acclaim from klezmer musicians around the world.  Stewart Curtis (K-Groove, UK) hailed it as “truly great authentic klezmer” and Stuart Brotman (Brave Old World & Veretski Pass, US) authenticated their “very intimate sound”, whilst Folk Roots Magazine say “it is a tremendous calling card for their increasingly acclaimed live performances.”

Frank London of the Grammy Award-winning Klezmatics says “The LKQ bring a wealth of knowledge, experience and excitement to their performances.”  Band members are well known on other world and pop music stages, recording and touring with artists ranging from Jackson Browne, Sinead O’Connor, The Indigo Girls, Natacha Atlas, oud master Ahmed Mukhtar to the klezmer/Balkan outfit She’Koyokh.

23rd March – Kantara House Greenpoint Central Coast 8pm – 10pm
24th March – Newcastle Synagogue 7.30pm – 9.30pm
25th March – Shir Madness Jewish music festival, Bondi Pavilion
26th March – Trinity’s Society of the Arts Sydney 7.30pm – 8.30pm
27th March – Sydney Jewish Museum 6.30pm – 9pm
28th March – Sydney Conservatorium (masterclass) 9am – 12noon
28th March – Wongawilli Hall Wollongong (Klezmer Keilidh ‘Hopkele’) 8pm – 10pm
29th March – Wollongong Conservatorium of Music (workshop 4pm) performance 7pm – 9pm
30th March – The Capital Bendigo 8pm – 10pm
31st March – Famous Spiegeltent Melbourne 3pm- 3.40pm
31st March – Boite presents a Klezmer ‘Hopkele’ @ Northcote Uniting Church, Melbourne 7.30pm – 21.30pm
1st  April – Famous Spiegeltent Melbourne – Klezkids – a klezmer party! 11am – noon
1st  April – Caravan Music Club Oakleigh RSL 8pm – 10pm
2nd April – Melba Hall University of Melbourne 1pm – 2pm
2nd April – Jika Jika Northcote, Melbourne (workshop) 7pm – 10pm
3rd April – Camelot Sydney 7.30pm – 10pm
4th April – Joan Sutherland Performing Arts Centre Penrith – 11am concert/workshop, 7pm performance
5th – 9th April – National Folk Festival Canberra
The band’s winning combination of exuberance, passion and accomplishment is proving popular – within a year of its formation in 2009, the LKQ was being booked by leading UK world and folk music promoters and festivals.  Come and hear this “gorgeous traditional playing full of ‘groove’ with so many creative and joyful twists!” (Deborah Strauss), and hotfoot it Yiddish style to those upbeat bulgars, sorrowful doinas and frenetic freylekhs!

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